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comtradr

R package for interacting with the UN Comtrade Database public API. UN Comtrade provides historical data on the weights and value of specific goods shipped between countries, more info can be found here. Full API documentation can be found here.

This package was inspired by the R tutorial posted by Comtrade, and is built using httr and jsonlite.

I've also built a Shiny app for visualizing comtrade shipping data, that's powered by this package. The app can be viewed here.

Please report issues, comments, or feature requests.

Please note that this project is released with a Contributor Code of Conduct. By participating in this project you agree to abide by its terms.

For information on citation of this package, use citation("comtradr")

Installation

Install from CRAN:

install.packages("comtradr")

Or install from this repo:

# install.packages("devtools")
devtools::install_github("ropensci/comtradr")

Example Usage

Example 1: Return all exports from China to South Korea, United States and Mexico, for all years

library(comtradr)

# Country names passed to the API query function must be spelled as they appear 
# in the Comtrade DB. Use "ct_country_lookup" to query the country DB and 
#return the exact spelling of specific countries.
ct_country_lookup("korea")
#> [1] "Dem. People's Rep. of Korea" "Rep. of Korea"

# Since we want South Korea, we'll use "Rep. of Korea" within the API query.
example1 <- ct_search(reporters = "China", 
                      partners = c("Rep. of Korea", "USA", "Mexico"), 
                      trade_direction = "exports")

# Inspect the return data
str(example1)
#> 'data.frame':    75 obs. of  35 variables:
#>  $ classification        : chr  "H4" "H4" "H4" "H4" ...
#>  $ year                  : int  2012 2012 2012 2013 2013 2013 2014 2014 2014 2015 ...
#>  $ period                : int  2012 2012 2012 2013 2013 2013 2014 2014 2014 2015 ...
#>  $ period_desc           : chr  "2012" "2012" "2012" "2013" ...
#>  $ aggregate_level       : int  0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ...
#>  $ is_leaf_code          : int  0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ...
#>  $ trade_flow_code       : int  2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 ...
#>  $ trade_flow            : chr  "Export" "Export" "Export" "Export" ...
#>  $ reporter_code         : int  156 156 156 156 156 156 156 156 156 156 ...
#>  $ reporter              : chr  "China" "China" "China" "China" ...
#>  $ reporter_iso          : chr  "CHN" "CHN" "CHN" "CHN" ...
#>  $ partner_code          : int  410 484 842 410 484 842 410 484 842 410 ...
#>  $ partner               : chr  "Rep. of Korea" "Mexico" "USA" "Rep. of Korea" ...
#>  $ partner_iso           : chr  "KOR" "MEX" "USA" "KOR" ...
#>  $ second_partner_code   : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ second_partner        : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ second_partner_iso    : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ customs_proc_code     : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ customs               : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ mode_of_transport_code: chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ mode_of_transport     : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ commodity_code        : chr  "TOTAL" "TOTAL" "TOTAL" "TOTAL" ...
#>  $ commodity             : chr  "All Commodities" "All Commodities" "All Commodities" "All Commodities" ...
#>  $ qty_unit_code         : int  1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 ...
#>  $ qty_unit              : chr  "No Quantity" "No Quantity" "No Quantity" "No Quantity" ...
#>  $ alt_qty_unit_code     : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ alt_qty_unit          : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ qty                   : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ alt_qty               : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ netweight_kg          : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ gross_weight_kg       : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ trade_value_usd       : num  8.77e+10 2.75e+10 3.52e+11 9.12e+10 2.90e+10 ...
#>  $ cif_trade_value_usd   : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ fob_trade_value_usd   : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ flag                  : int  0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ...
#>  - attr(*, "url")= chr "https://comtrade.un.org/api/get?max=50000&type=C&freq=A&px=HS&ps=all&r=156&p=410%2C842%2C484&rg=2&cc=TOTAL&fmt=json&head=H"
#>  - attr(*, "time_stamp")= POSIXct, format: "2018-05-04 20:03:23"
#>  - attr(*, "req_duration")= num 1.02

Example 2: Return all exports related to shrimp from Thailand to all other countries, for years 2007 thru 2011

library(comtradr)

# Fetch all shrimp related commodity codes from the Comtrade commodities DB. 
# This vector of codes will get passed to the API query.
shrimp_codes <- ct_commodity_lookup("shrimp", return_code = TRUE, return_char = TRUE)

# API query.
example2 <- ct_search(reporters = "Thailand", 
                      partners = "All", 
                      trade_direction = "exports", 
                      start_date = 2007, 
                      end_date = 2011, 
                      commod_codes = shrimp_codes)

# Inspect the output
str(example2)
#> 'data.frame':    1203 obs. of  35 variables:
#>  $ classification        : chr  "H3" "H3" "H3" "H3" ...
#>  $ year                  : int  2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 ...
#>  $ period                : int  2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 2007 ...
#>  $ period_desc           : chr  "2007" "2007" "2007" "2007" ...
#>  $ aggregate_level       : int  6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 ...
#>  $ is_leaf_code          : int  1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 ...
#>  $ trade_flow_code       : int  2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 ...
#>  $ trade_flow            : chr  "Export" "Export" "Export" "Export" ...
#>  $ reporter_code         : int  764 764 764 764 764 764 764 764 764 764 ...
#>  $ reporter              : chr  "Thailand" "Thailand" "Thailand" "Thailand" ...
#>  $ reporter_iso          : chr  "THA" "THA" "THA" "THA" ...
#>  $ partner_code          : int  0 36 40 48 56 104 116 124 152 156 ...
#>  $ partner               : chr  "World" "Australia" "Austria" "Bahrain" ...
#>  $ partner_iso           : chr  "WLD" "AUS" "AUT" "BHR" ...
#>  $ second_partner_code   : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ second_partner        : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ second_partner_iso    : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ customs_proc_code     : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ customs               : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ mode_of_transport_code: chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ mode_of_transport     : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ commodity_code        : chr  "030613" "030613" "030613" "030613" ...
#>  $ commodity             : chr  "Shrimps & prawns, whether/not in shell, frozen" "Shrimps & prawns, whether/not in shell, frozen" "Shrimps & prawns, whether/not in shell, frozen" "Shrimps & prawns, whether/not in shell, frozen" ...
#>  $ qty_unit_code         : int  8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 ...
#>  $ qty_unit              : chr  "Weight in kilograms" "Weight in kilograms" "Weight in kilograms" "Weight in kilograms" ...
#>  $ alt_qty_unit_code     : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ alt_qty_unit          : chr  NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ qty                   : int  169654441 5545602 1265 29780 2721318 750 8510 13088545 4930 3410678 ...
#>  $ alt_qty               : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ netweight_kg          : int  169654441 5545602 1265 29780 2721318 750 8510 13088545 4930 3410678 ...
#>  $ gross_weight_kg       : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ trade_value_usd       : int  1084677273 36120291 11888 124668 16061545 4521 74842 77292118 64218 18400152 ...
#>  $ cif_trade_value_usd   : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ fob_trade_value_usd   : logi  NA NA NA NA NA NA ...
#>  $ flag                  : int  0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ...
#>  - attr(*, "url")= chr "https://comtrade.un.org/api/get?max=50000&type=C&freq=A&px=HS&ps=2007%2C2008%2C2009%2C2010%2C2011&r=764&p=all&r"| __truncated__
#>  - attr(*, "time_stamp")= POSIXct, format: "2018-05-04 20:03:26"
#>  - attr(*, "req_duration")= num 3.19

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Version

Install

install.packages('comtradr')

Monthly Downloads

1,282

Version

0.2.1

License

GPL-3

Issues

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Stars

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Maintainer

Chris Muir

Last Published

May 5th, 2018

Functions in comtradr (0.2.1)

ct_search

Get UN Comtrade data
ct_commodity_lookup

UN Comtrade commodities database query
ct_register_token

Comtradr set API token
ct_country_lookup

UN Comtrade country database query
ct_update_databases

Check for updates to country/commodity databases
ct_get_reset_time

Comtradr rate limit time check
comtradr

Interface to the United Nations Comtrade API
ct_pretty_cols

"pretty" column headers for Comtrade API data.
ct_get_remaining_hourly_queries

Comtradr rate limit check
ct_use_pretty_cols

Use Pretty Column Headers
ct_commodity_db_type

Get current commodity database type